The Universal Mirror

by Gwen Perkins

  “I never wanted to be any part of the Council, but that was never any choice of mine,” Felix continued. “I was born to it. And it was always made clear that I was born to serve, not to command. It’s a noble tradition to be a part of the Steward’s house—in fact, it’s made Carnicus one of the higher houses—that doesn’t mean, however, that it gives us any actual power.” He grimaced. “And there is nothing noble, nor honorable, about keeping secrets such as these.”

  “You encouraged me to talk to the Geographer,” Asahel pointed out. “You told me to keep those secrets.”

  “You acted as if Quentin had gone mad, for one thing. Don’t doubt your own part in this,” Felix said, his words bladed. “Not to mention, you put me in a position where I had to guard myself and my own interests. You kept coming to my house at incredibly odd hours of the night, often clearly distraught. It was obvious that I had some part in your plan. And after you paid your visit to Tycho? I’ve proven myself loyal by setting you back on his path—but we have no need to keep rehashing this old story. Why did you call me here, Asahel? If this was it, then wash your hands of it or push me off the dock and be done with me.”

  “I…” Asahel’s fingers curled around the wooden railing, ignoring the splinters that dug into his coarse skin. “…need you.” He paused again, then amended, “Catharine and I need you.”

  “For what?” Felix had the look of a wolf backed into a corner.

  “We have to prove that Quentin shouldn’t be in prison,” Asahel said, breathing hard. “We have to show Cercia that the Geographer started the Plagues.”

  Chapter 26

  “Don’t die,” Quentin whispered as he knelt next to the bed of straw, watching the man’s chest rise and fall with each labored breath. The cell smelled worse than it had before, congealed food and sweat so heavy in the air that it choked the pressed, tight space. Dirt clouded every inch of the floor, but Quentin had long made his peace with it, growing used to matted hair and filthy cotton. What worried him now was the heat coming from his cellmate, his skin burning so fierce that the warmth seemed to come off in waves.

  Swallowing hard, he wetted a strip of fabric torn from his shirt with the little drinking water they had left, wringing it out into the bucket to save what he could. Gently, the redhead placed the strip across the other man’s forehead, resting his palm against his skin in an attempt to soothe as he moaned.

  Healing, he thought. He’s going to die. What if I could give him a chance at life? Not for the first time, Quentin’s eyes stared at the small patch of earth that he could see through a crack in the floor. It would have been enough for Asahel to pull magic from—as for himself, Quent was not so sure.

  He felt the other man twist from his touch and he pulled back slightly. At least he has the strength to resist—that has to be a good sign. Quentin sighed, wishing that he knew more about the man lying on the straw. There was no one to tell him save for his cellmate himself.

  “What’s your name?” He tried whispering but received no answer that he could understand. There was nothing to do but wait, and, with a sigh, he stood up, still in thought. His fingers reached around the bars and he leaned into the iron, letting it press against his skin. There was nowhere else to go in the cramped space, so he would take what respite might be offered.

  When the sound of footsteps came down the hallway, he didn’t move. His eyes closed, expecting to hear the guards again with their frightened, hoarse voices that always cracked when they caught sight of the sick man. They came less and less often—Quentin wondered whether one day they would stop coming at all. Now wasn’t to be that day, it seemed to him as he remained in his silent trance.

  “He’s so thin.” The low voice of a woman carried down the narrow hall, as sweet a sound as he’d ever heard. You’re dreaming, he thought to himself. She’s not here. Quentin kept his eyes close, cheek pressed against the bars, to preserve the dream as long as possible.

  “He’s in prison.” A guard’s words followed. “You only have a few moments, milady. Worry about that later.” The footsteps came closer, lighter than a pair of boots and slower, as if the walker feared the path that they were treading.

  “Quent.” He smelled violets as the whisper warmed his face. “Open your eyes. Please, Quentin.” His eyes cracked open slowly, fixing on his wife’s nose first of all. She was pressed against the bars as tightly as he—so tall that they were almost of a height—and she smiled as he stared at her nose. “Your eyes are crossing. I do hope it’s not permanent.” The tip of her nose bumped his as she stood on tiptoe.

  “Are you real?” Quentin asked her, shivering from the heat and her nearness. He had always believed his wife beautiful, but in the darkness of the prison, she shone. Her brown hair rippled down her back, neat and clean, her eyes the same color that they had always been, but he saw them more clearly now. His finger reached out, touching the scars on her lip, but for once, she flinched but did not pull away.

  “I’m real.” Catharine said. “What kind of a question is that?” She looked immediately sorry after she’d said it, her mouth opening to speak again but Quentin cut her off with a laugh before she could continue.

  “Now I do know that it’s you.” He let his fingers slip through the bars but she did not take them. “What’s happened?”

  “You’re in prison. I think that’s a rather large happening.” Her mouth pressed together as she glanced back over her shoulder.

  “No, I mean, what news? The Council has said nothing, told me of no ex—punishment.”

  “Nor I.” Catharine was much quieter then, leaning in still closer to say, “They’ve not even said what you’re here for. It’s as if—wait. Who is that man behind you?” She squinted at his cellmate, her face quickly contorting as she caught sight of the pockmarks on his face, then hissed, “Quentin, he’s got the Plague.”

  “I know that. You’re safe,” he tried to soothe her but her eyes were still wild.

  “What about you? They can’t do this. You’re not some animal, to be trapped in here to die. Do the guards know what kind of suffering that man is under? What could happen to you? You haven’t even got a bed. Quentin—”

  “Hush.” He stretched a finger out for her lips but failed to touch them again. “Catharine, they mean for me to die.”

  “I won’t let them,” she said, fierce.

  “You never cared before.” Quentin sank back, sitting down on the floor. He was still next to the bars where she could reach him if she chose. She followed him, kneeling in the muck. The muddy runoff from the cell soaked the pale crushed velvet of her skirts, blending the pinks with brown. Catharine pushed her body back against the bars so firmly that they shook against her weight.

  “You were never about to die before,” his wife told him. “Would you prefer that I stop caring?”

  “No,” he admitted with a sheepish grin.

  “Good.” Her hand fell to her stomach, her skin greening slightly. “I’ve been speaking to… friends.” Catharine hesitated, then added, “You won’t be in here forever.” It was tremulous as if she repeated it mostly to reassure herself.

  “We only have a few moments. Can we talk about something else, perhaps?” What Quentin would not say was that he didn’t want to remember her like this, so desperately grasping at love and straws for a life that neither of them had lived before he came to the prison.

  “I want to talk about why,” she whispered, her hands now slipping around the bars as she pulled herself up a little higher.

  “What do you mean? Why I’m in here? Did Asahel not tell you?” Quentin murmured back, his voice as quiet as he could make it.

  “No, he told me and… he explained it a little.” Catharine looked more ill than she had before, rubbing her mouth on the back of her hand. It appeared that her eyes were glimmering faintly in the dim light and he reached out, catching her fingers with his own.

  “What did he explain?” Nothing about the way that she looked implied that what Asahel had said w
as anything good. Quentin frowned, squeezing her hand a little tighter as he waited for the answer.

  “This is all because you wanted to heal me,” she said, staring down at their interlocked hands. It was her hand that her gaze focused on, on the pitted skin and the red weals that crisscrossed her knuckles still. “He didn’t say it so baldly as that, but I know that you don’t… that you want me to look as I might have before the illness took me. When I was beautiful.”

  “You’ve always been beautiful,” Quentin snapped, his grip tightening. She yanked her hand away, rubbing it furiously. To his surprise, the look that she returned to him wasn’t angry. It simply spoke of something lost that she had no hope of finding.

  “Don’t lie to me. Not now.” She stood up, her skirts sweeping against the iron bars. He followed her movement, scrambling to stay at level with her eyes. “My father bought you for me, I know that. We both know it. You can’t pretend that your touch on our wedding night was due to your great desire for me—you barely… knew me then.”

  “And you were no better,” Quentin’s voice shook. “I was afraid, Catharine—am I not allowed even that? Ever since that first night, every action I’ve taken you’ve attributed to your skin. It doesn’t matter what I feel or have felt because you won’t allow anything past that sharp tongue of yours and those hard shoulders.” His hands were quaking as he gripped the bars, longing to wrench the distance away from the two of them and hold her fast so that he could prove the truth of his words.

  “Then why?” Catharine cried. “If you love me so much, if I am so beautiful, then why commit Heresy to change me? Why do you want me to be what I am not?”

  “I had to do it, don’t you see?” His bony wrist twisted through the bars as he tried to reach her, holding out his hand. “I have to make you beautiful so that you’ll love me. You won’t let me love you as long as you hate yourself.”

  “You never—” She choked back her thoughts, turning away from him. All that he could see was the curve of Catharine’s neck, straining as she fought her tears. “I can’t do this, Quentin. I’m sorry. I can’t.”

  “Just tell me…” Quentin began, but she was gone before he could finish the words, nothing left of her but the lingering scent of violets and the soft, hurried sound of her feet running down the hallway. Tell me that you love me. He slammed his palms against the bars so hard that they rattled but the guards did not come. The man at the other end of the cell began to cough again, a low wheezing interrupting the pounding in Quentin’s head.

  “Will you just…” Stop it, had been on the tip of his tongue to say, so tense he felt at his wife’s sudden exit. Staring at the other prisoner did nothing but provoke pity within Quentin for them both. To have gone through that illness so young, he thought as he returned to the other man’s side. It’s no wonder she can’t understand what I’m trying to tell her. And perhaps… she’s right. Maybe neither of us gave one another a chance.

  He wondered if they would get that second chance now or if he was meant to take ill and rot himself in this damp cell beneath the earth.

  “Don’t…” The stranger gasped. Quentin leaned forward, his ear close to the other man’s mouth. “Leave… help…”

  “I wish that I could help,” he told the man, his hands taking the other’s in his own. It was the only comfort that he could think of to offer, as near to the end as they seemed to be. His foot brushed the patch of earth and he frowned but let it rest on the ground.

  “My wife was here,” Quentin said, not able to do anything more than talk. “She had this sickness as a child and she recovered. You might do the same.” His hand smoothed out the pox scars as he thought of Catharine, still absorbed in the memory of her. “I wish that I could have taken it from her.” He fell quiet, picturing the illness as a river that he could draw from her, flowing out of her and into him.

  It was then that he felt the spark of energy in his knuckles.

  “Are you a magician?” The other man’s head lolled in a gesture that could only be denial.

  Quentin focused again, this time on the body before him, picturing the sickness as a stream of energy. He felt it begin to pass through him, heat and fire roaring through his veins as both men began to sweat. Magic crashed against his heart, slamming so hard that he gasped, his hand clenching tight to the sick man in order to maintain the link. It screamed down through the rest of his skin, arcing into his bones and down until it finally blasted into the earth on which he stood. A small pillar of dirt surrounded his feet, caked up around his ankles as he panted from the sensation.

  His lungs ached as if he’d breathed fire, but after he blinked the sweat from his eyes, he saw that he was still holding the other man’s hand in his own.

  The stranger’s eyes were closed but his breathing was steady and even. Quentin let his grip slide and reached up to touch his forehead. It was as cool as the river that he’d pictured, no trace left of the fever that had haunted him since the man had first come into his cell. The redhead swallowed, brushing back a strand of dark hair from his cellmate’s forehead.

  “What are you doing?” A pair of steady green eyes blinked open.

  “You’re awake?” Quentin jolted back, expecting the eyes to close but they were as lucid as if the man had never been ill at all.

  “Aye, for what it’s worth.” He sat up, rubbing the marks still on his hands. “But I was dying of the plague, man.” His head swung over to stare at Quentin. “What did you do?”

  Quentin smiled as he stepped back to the bars but it was uneasy and cold. “Something that I’ve been working on for a very long time.”

  Chapter 27

  “I don’t want him here,” was all Catharine said as she looked at Felix. She did not need to say more—her eyes told the story of her anger as they narrowed themselves into two little slits. She would have fit arrows into them if she could have, it seemed, from the venom in her glare. Asahel sighed, standing in the middle of the two of them, wishing that they were standing in his home or a place in which he felt secure.

  They were near the first site at which the Summer Court pitched camp. The journey of the Court away from the capital’s winding roads would be long—it was that on which they were counting. The plan that Catharine had devised was not without considerable risk, and depended on luck. We’ll only see this through if we’re not discovered, Asahel thought. And there’s little chance of that.

  “Want me or not, you have me.” Felix’s answer was steady as he watched the encampment begin. The Court had chosen its first stop at House Donat, a house that had grown in status but not size over the past few years. Courtiers stumbled over one another, searching for rooms in which to house their servants. Balky horses were being tethered hastily outside of a stable within which there was little room to house the full body of steeds needed for afternoon rides. All around them were the signs of chaos. Asahel wondered how aware of that Catharine had been—by the small, satisfied smile that returned to her lips as she also watched, he believed that she had calculated for it.

  “Use the tools that you have, my father says, but he never had to deal with the man who sold his husband out.” Felix said nothing in response though his fingers brushed the hilt of his sword.

  “We’re not here to fight, aye?” Asahel crossed his arms, looking at the movement below. “We came to take something, and we’ll need all that we’ve got to do it. It was your idea, Catharine, so you’ll not spend the time arguing at one another.” To his surprise, she stopped speaking, choosing instead to fix her eyes on the scene below.

  “It’s a fools’ plan.” Felix turned back to the two of them. He was smiling as he shook his head, brown strands of hair falling into his eyes. “But let me see if I have it—I’m to wander about, distract Tycho, and the pair of you will do the rest from there.”

  “Distracting him wouldn’t be easy, I shouldn’t think,” Asahel murmured.

  “You underestimate my ability to ramble just as I do your thieving abilities.” Felix
commented. “Let’s hope that we’re both wrong.”

  “We’ll all be wrong if we’re caught here talking,” Catharine pointed out. Her fingers threaded themselves through the fabric of her skirts nervously. “How will we know if you’ve been caught?”

  “You’ll see my head on the capital’s walls,” the older man answered. “Soames, I’ll send word if I’ve made it through successfully and if not, the two of you should be prepared to… do whatever it is that Catharine has planned.”

  Public exposure, Asahel thought, feeling sick to his stomach. The ground seemed to lurch and sway underneath his feet. He felt Felix’s hand reach out to steady him and brushed it off. It was not the time for a weak heart.

  “Then there’s no point in waiting, aye?” Asahel asked, realizing that it was his direction on which they hinged. He felt stiff taking the lead. A faint flush of pink covered Asahel’s nose as he scratched the back of his neck, then rested his palm there.

  “No, there’s not.” Felix’s smile was slow but steady, breaking Catharine’s as he looked at her. “What do you say, Cat? Will you deliver us our marching orders?”

  “Not gladly but I will.” The activity in the courtyard had lessened. Dizzied courtiers had found their places, leaving behind the servants who usually populated the manor. The clang of hammer on iron echoed from nearby, signaling that daily activities had commenced. The rich smell of roasting beef filled the air, heavy with the scent of cloves and galingale. It indicated that change was afoot despite the now-calm atmosphere—spices so rich were never served at the ordinary table, however rich a lord present.